Fodor's Prague & Budapest, 1st Edition: The Complete Guide with Great City Walks and Country Drives (Travel Guide) - Softcover

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This excerpt from the essay "Under the Spell" by Matt Welch in the Destination: Prague and Budapest section, gives you a taste of what Prague and Budapest have to offer and the sights and scenes that makes them great places to visit.


Under the Spell


Unlike much of Western Europe, Prague and Budapest can easily satiate the castle-and-church set while at the same time inviting adventurous spirits into a whimsical café-and-club party that seems to have been raging since 1878.


Prague and Budapest's intoxicating mixes of beautiful settings, dynamic times, and -- not least -- cheap and tasty local drink, have convinced thousands of visitors since 1989 to stay just one more week, which turned into years.  Luckily for hospitality's sake, Czechs and Hungarians love to hunker down over beer and brandy shots with strangers, so if you go out for a polite night on the town you can easily wind up, 36 hours later, with a dozen new friends, a smoking habit, and skeleton keys to a downtown apartment.


It has not always been thus. Prague, during the Communist "normalization" period of the 1970s and '80s, was a miserable place.


After 51 consecutive years of living under failed 20th-century political systems, Czechs and Hungarians threw long and sweet coming-out parties in 1989--90.


Nine years into the process, the cities and people have changed seismically. In Prague, the smothering blanket of gray has given way to birthday-cake pastels.  Budapest has a rash of modern office buildings and spruced-up promenades; it's also starting work on a new metro line.


Mere steps off the beaten tourist paths, the hidden spirits that seem to govern Prague and Budapest reveal themselves, transcending and even laughing at the political and social shifts of the moment.


Prague's spirit is clever and romantic, with a decidedly dark sense of humor. The easily walkable Malá Strana (Lesser Quarter), StaréMesto (Old Town), and NovéMesto (New Town) are all haunted alleyways and curves, some leading to hidden 13th-century churches, some coming to abrupt stops, others emptying into exuberant squares or regal gardens.


Just off Wenceslas Square you can find the world's most frivolous Cubist lamp standing next to the solemn Gothic heights of the 14th-century Church of Our Lady of the Snows -- and to complete the absurd picture, there's a Japanese bonsai garden in the church's backyard.


Visits to the National Gallery, the stunningly restored Art Nouveau Municipal House, and the cavernous new Museum of Modern Art will tell you much of what you need to know about Czech history and art, from the empire years of King Charles IV to the mad alchemy of Rudolf II to the exuberant but unsteady days of the interwar First Republic.  The city is weird, inhabited by ghosts, tangled with mysterious, narrow streets -- a legendary source of inspiration. But for true immersion, nothing beats stepping into any one of a thousand neighborhood pubs, drinking the best beer in the world for 50 cents a pint, watching as the dour locals suddenly spring to life when someone breaks out a guitar, and then stumbling back out into the world to watch the sun rise over a mercifully empty Charles Bridge.


Budapest, unlike Prague, is haunted by memories of more recent grandeur, specifically the Austro-Hungarian empire era of 1867--1918. The streets are grand and broad, suitable for victory marches, and the city's dividing river is the wide, impressive Danube, a stronger presence than Prague's winsome Vltava.  Many buildings are still pockmarked with bullet holes from the 1956 uprising and the extensive battles that ripped the city apart in World War II.


But visitors expecting a mopey lot grumbling over 19th-century maps are in for a shocker. Hungarians are a hyper-smart, multilingual, and deeply sensual people who enjoy the finer things in life, from Turkish baths to good red wine to coffee cakes drenched in chocolate. Hospitality knows no limits (though one must be careful about scam artists), and people seem to have an uncanny knack for knowing exactly what foreigners want. There is a whiff of decadence and chaos in the air, a happy remnant from the hated 1541--1686 Ottoman occupation. Hungarians seem to have picked up only the nicer of the Balkan habits, such as promenading each afternoon down the riverside korzo and other pedestrian zones.


Indeed, the country truly serves as a European crossroads between East and West, North and South. On the streets, it is common to hear Russian, Arabic, Serbo-Croatian, English, and German. Roman ruins lie next to Turkish mosques across the river from the largest synagogue in Europe. There are excellent French, Greek, Italian, Turkish, Mexican, Irish, and Japanese restaurants, and of course the blood-red Hungarian eateries with Gypsy violinists wearing folk vests. But unlike Prague, Budapest's arts and culture scene is still a bit hesitant, trying to weigh the past while incorporating a flood of imported entertainment.


As post-communism rolls toward its second decade, Prague and Budapest have emerged as the political and cultural epicenters of the former Eastern bloc. Prague has reawakened in its role as capital of Bohemia, becoming the favored European tour date for inventive rock and pop acts and inspiring untold thousands of wild young souls to pursue their artistic and entrepreneurial dreams. Budapest attracts multinational companies with equal success, even luring some European headquarters away from nearby Vienna. Hungary is blazing most trails in Central European economic reform, and Budapest's activist mayor is halfway through an ambitious renewal plan aiming to restore the city's salon culture to its pre--World War I splendor.


Hungary and the Czech Republic are quickly distancing themselves from their Communist past; soon they will have their own stars on the European Union flag, and the best Hungarian wines and Czech beers will be sold for prices depressingly familiar to travelers from the West. Before the window closes, though, Prague and Budapest will continue to seduce, infuriate, and even ensnare those daring enough to visit.